(Adds details, background, graphic) ROME, Oct 10 (Reuters) – Italian industrial output slumped in August by 2.4% from the month before, data showed on Friday, in a renewed sign of weakness for the country's long-struggling manufacturing sector. A Reuters survey of 13 analysts had pointed to a 0.4% decrease, after a 0.4% month-on-month rise in July. August's decline extended to all the main industrial sectors, national statistics agency ISTAT said, driving a 0.6% fall in the June-August period compared to the previous three months. On a work day-adjusted year-on-year basis, industrial output plunged 2.7% in August versus a forecast for a 0.5% increase, following a 0.9% rise in July. Both the month-on-month and year-on-year declines were the steepest since December last year. In a further sign of weakness, last week a purchasing managers' survey of the manufacturing sector signalled a return to contraction in September after a fleeting recovery in August. Gross domestic product in the euro zone's third largest economy shrank by 0.1% in the second quarter from the previous three months, and Giorgia Meloni's government last week marginally lowered its forecast for full-year 2025 growth to 0.5% from an April projection of 0.6%. (Reporting by Antonella Cinelli, graphic by Stefano Bernabei, editing by Gavin Jones)
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